Certain medical and dental appliances, such as dental handpieces, require the supply of multiple fluids during their operation. For example, a dental handpiece may require air to be supplied under pressure to drive the turbine by which the dental burr or other tool is driven. The dental handpiece may also be provided with outlets for projection of cooling air and/or water upon a tooth as it is being abraded by a dental burr driven by the handpiece. In the case of the drive air, the exhaust air is sometimes conveyed out of the mouth rather than being exhausted from the turbine directly into the mouth. These fluids have been conveyed to and from the mouth in flexible tubes and, for convenience of handling and appearance, the tubes have been bundled together. It is also commonplace to form such bundles by extruding a plurality of tubes connected by webs of the extruded material. As provided heretofore, such webs provided a concave surface between adjacent pairs of tubes which is undesirable in that foreign matter may deposit therein.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide a new and improved conduit structure for conveying a multiple number of fluids to a medical or dental appliance.
More particularly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a conduit structure which is substantially free of indentations on its exterior surface in which foreign matter can collect.
Still another object of the invention is to provide a conduit structure comprising multiple tubes connected by webs wherein the webs are of lesser thickness along their juncture with each of the adjacent tubes whereby the webs may be stripped from such tubes easily and cleanly.
Other objects and advantages of the invention will become more apparent hereinafter.